Post by dgriffin on May 14, 2011 22:54:36 GMT -5
These news stories were collected by the Property Tax Reform Press Office.
Governor is hoping public will stand up against Legislature
MICHAEL GORMLEY-Associated Press | Posted: Tuesday, May 10, 2011 8:33 pm
ALBANY - Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday that he’s facing “fierce” opposition to his proposed property tax cap in Albany and needs New Yorkers to issue an ultimatum to their elected officials: Pass it or “don’t come home.”
The message was released in a video that Cuomo and his aides will repeat in a statewide tour on his policy goals, which also include ethics reform and legalizing gay marriage. Cuomo said, however, that his property tax cap plan is “job one.”
Meanwhile, opponents called Cuomo’s cap a political mirage that benefits the wealthy at the expense of school children.
“The people are going to have to overpower the lobbyists,” Cuomo said. “The peoples’ voice wins in a democracy. But the peoples’ voice must be heard ... tell your elected representatives in Albany that enough is enough. Pass the tax cap now or don’t come home.”
Back in Albany, a broad coalition including teachers and other public workers’ unions, the League of Women Voters and other good-government groups urged the Legislature to alter Cuomo’s proposal. The Omnibus Consortium said a “hard” property tax cap of 2 percent growth a year will hurt schools and local social services while not providing tax relief to those who need it most. The group wants a “circuit breaker” that would factor in taxpayers’ incomes to drive more tax relief to middle and lower income New Yorkers, and less to wealthier property owners to continue what the group considers adequate funding for schools and local government services and their workers.
“The simplest solution to a problem is not always the most effective,” said Bill Samuels, founder of the government reform group called the New Roosevelt Initiative. “Overburdened taxpayers with limited incomes need personal property tax relief now. And woe to the politician who supports this rhetorically popular, but ill-conceived, tax cap when their constituents open their next tax bill and find no relief.”
Gioia Shebar of the group Tax Nightmare says Cuomo’s cap is a gift to corporate taxpayers.
“The discredited cap doesn’t meet any need but for politicians to look busy,” Shebar said. “Our inequitable, chaotic tax system — which cries out for reform — has resulted in that classic moment when panicked leaders say, ‘Shut up and drink the Kool-Aid,’” Shebar said Tuesday.
Cuomo stopped at Syracuse’s Onondaga Community College Tuesday to kick off the tour scheduled to continue through the final weeks of the legislative session, which ends in late June. Cuomo is expected to focus on the property tax in upstate stops and on Long Island, where the issue has long been a priority of residents. The gay marriage bill he favors is expected to continue to be an issue in New York City, where support has been strongest in polls.
He will walk a fine line by going into local markets to pressure lawmakers without antagonizing the Legislature. Former Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s similar effort in 2007 resulted in gridlock.
Cuomo is also expected to push for his ethics reform measure, which is being negotiated with legislative leaders in closed-door sessions. No bill or draft has yet been released for the measure, which would be aimed at forcing greater disclosure of income and higher standards for lawmakers.
The popular Democrat’s cap proposal would limit the growth in local property taxes, already among the highest in the nation, to 2 percent annually or the rate of inflation, whichever is less. Local voters could override the cap with a 60-percent vote. A few exemptions of unforeseeable expenses could also suspend the cap.
“The cap will put the odds in favor of the taxpayer, because the deck has been stacked against the taxpayers for too long,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo said local government and school property taxes rose 73 percent over the last decade, more than double the inflation rate. That forces people from their homes and stymies job growth, he said.
The Republican-led Senate has already passed Cuomo’s proposal, but is refusing to negotiate what its members would consider a weakening of the measure. Cuomo’s bill is sponsored in the Democrat-led Assembly by Speaker Sheldon Silver, but it hasn’t moved any closer to a floor vote and the Democrats from New York City who lead the chamber are being pressured by teacher unions that oppose the cap.
Cuomo sends message to Legislature: Pass the property tax cap
• Written by Jon Campbell
jcampbell1@gannett.com
ALBANY -- When it comes to his property tax cap proposal, Gov. Andrew Cuomo delivered his harshest message yet to the Legislature: pass it, or don't come home.
In a video message released Tuesday morning, Cuomo challenged New Yorkers to push legislators to pass his bill, which would establish a hard, 2 percent annual cap on property tax levies by local governments and schools.
Cuomo's message coincided with the launch of a statewide tour promoting his legislative agenda, which kicked off Tuesday in Syracuse.
"Remember, the people's voice wins in a democracy, but the people's voice must be heard," Cuomo said in the video. "Tell your representatives in Albany that enough is enough; pass the tax cap now or don't come home."
The governor's push came the same day advocates both for and against the tax cap gathered in Albany. A pro-cap rally quickly devolved into a back-and-forth shouting match Tuesday morning, with opponents chanting "tax the rich" while lawmakers tried to voice their support for the bill.
Soon after things wrapped up, the two sides argued their case on the floor of the Legislative Office Building -- at times loudly and inches apart -- as reporters snapped photos and television cameras rolled.
Opponents of a cap have pushed for a "circuit breaker" approach, which would limit property-tax rates for low- and middle-income taxpayers.
Ron Deutsch, executive director of New Yorkers for Fiscal Fairness, said the circuit breaker is the choice of the people, and the only way to provide meaningful relief.
"The reality is what the governor is talking about is increasing taxes for people on an annual basis," Deutsch said. "So if I can't afford my property taxes now, what good is a tax cap going to do me? Only a circuit breaker would help me in that situation."
Assemblywoman Ellen Jaffee, D-Suffern, Rockland County, was critical of a tax cap, calling it a "sound bite, not sound policy" at an anti-cap press conference. Her concerns echo those of many county, municipal and education leaders, who have said a cap without relief from mandate costs would spell trouble for local governments' finances.
"It is a policy that is a recipe for disaster in our education system, and in our municipalities in New York state," Jaffee said. "It does not provide tax relief, and while we all recognized the need for property-tax relief, we need to moveforward with the appropriate legislation that will actually offer that."
But Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan, told reporters Tuesday he has no plans to take up circuit-breaker legislation. Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos said he supports a hard cap, with no exemptions for pensions, health care or other expenses.
The Senate passed Cuomo's tax-cap proposal in January, but the Democrat-led Assembly has been reluctant to take it up. Assembly Democrats plan to reveal a compromise bill in the coming days that will cap taxes at 2 percent, but will include some exemptions, Silver told reporters Tuesday.
"We are finalizing the bill," Silver said. "We've briefed the governor on it. He's aware of it, and we will introduce it one of these days."
Silver declined to discuss the specifics of his conference's proposal, but some Assembly Democrats said last week that talks had centered around allowing the bill to expire in three to five years and exempting pension costs from the cap.
Skelos said Tuesday his conference will "look at it" if Cuomo decides to "weaken" his proposal, but reiterated Senate Republicans¹ support a hard cap.
"The governor has been very clear, and we stand with the governor, that he wants a hard property-tax cap," Skelos said.
But speaking with reporters after presenting his agenda in Syracuse, Cuomo said the bill must pass both houses for the Senate to claim success.
"If the tax cap passes and people have tax relief, then government will have done its job," Cuomo said. "If a tax cap doesn't pass, government will have failed. It's that simple. To me, it's binary."
###
Tax cap a moving target
Officials say Gov. Cuomo's proposal is on right track but changes threaten deal
By JIMMY VIELKIND Capitol bureau
Published 12:01 a.m., Wednesday, May 11, 2011
ALBANY -- During a media blitz to build support for a 2 percent cap on property tax increases, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the Republican-led Senate shouldn't get "an A for effort" for passing in January ... a tax cap bill drafted by Cuomo's office.
"That's Albany-speak," said Cuomo, a Democrat, after a rally in a Syracuse suburb. "That's 'I passed a bill, the other person didn't pass a bill.' ... When the people of the state of New York have a property tax cap, then they will have done their job."
In an earlier videotaped message, Cuomo said lawmakers must enact a cap "or don't come home" to their districts.
It's a rare acknowledgment of the back-and-forth legislative process that results in most laws in the state. Politically, the governor's singling out the Senate Republicans on this issue moves him into closer alignment with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan.
A Cuomo aide said the governor's comment applied to both legislative leaders, but it illustrates a shift: For the past several months of his term, Cuomo was allied with Skelos to enact a budget that did not renew an income tax surcharge on New Yorkers earning over $200,000. The governor has preached fiscal conservatism, and the enacted budget largely mirrored Cuomo's proposals. (As a result, Cuomo now enjoys a higher job approval rating among Republicans than among Democrats in a Marist College poll released Tuesday.)
Skelos has even touted passage of the property tax cap, in the form of a "program bill" submitted by Cuomo, as a symbol of his proximity to the governor. But he was left slightly on the defensive Tuesday as news of Cuomo's comments reached Albany.
"If the governor feels (the cap) should be weakened, then he should say it should be weakened," said Skelos, R-Long Island. "That's up to the Assembly. They could pass the bill or not pass the bill."
Silver said Tuesday he has briefed Cuomo on his house's proposal, which his aides are "finalizing" and which will be introduced "one of these days." He declined to offer details, but said it would contain "not too many exemptions" for perennial cost drivers such as pension costs and health care.
Local government leaders from both parties as well as school board officials have said a tax cap without relief of some mandates would be ruinous for their finances.
Last week, Assemblyman Joe Morelle, D-Rochester, told Gannett News Service he would like to see a temporary three-year cap that excluded pension costs. Most lawmakers read this as a floated point for negotiation.
"Certainly we're looking at doing a meaningful, real property tax cap, but from my position there's got to be some assistance for the locals, including pension costs and possibly health care costs, so we don't tie their hands in a very rigid manner," said Assembly Majority Leader Ron Canestrari, D-Cohoes.
It's a tough line to walk. Two competing rallies -- one in favor of a straight cap, the other calling for a "circuit breaker" which would offer property tax relief by increasing income taxes (and which Silver, who has passed a similar measure in the past, said was off the table this year) -- converged Tuesday at the Capitol, and devolved into a screaming match.
So -- to negotiate or not to negotiate? And how similar is that question to asking whether legislators' true goal is the enactment of a law or a political sound bite?
"The people doing the screaming is a small group of people," said Assembly Minority Leader Brian Kolb, R-Canandaigua, as he watched the shouting. He wants the Assembly to vote on Cuomo's bill. While his Republicans don't have a majority of votes, he was confident it would pass.
"It's always about the moving target," he added. "If we keep introducing new ideas, new measures, new approaches, you never get a vote on the main issue, and the main issue is Gov. Cuomo is the governor of the state. It's his program bill."
Reach Vielkind at 454-5081 or jvielkind@timesunion.com.
###
Governor is hoping public will stand up against Legislature
MICHAEL GORMLEY-Associated Press | Posted: Tuesday, May 10, 2011 8:33 pm
ALBANY - Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday that he’s facing “fierce” opposition to his proposed property tax cap in Albany and needs New Yorkers to issue an ultimatum to their elected officials: Pass it or “don’t come home.”
The message was released in a video that Cuomo and his aides will repeat in a statewide tour on his policy goals, which also include ethics reform and legalizing gay marriage. Cuomo said, however, that his property tax cap plan is “job one.”
Meanwhile, opponents called Cuomo’s cap a political mirage that benefits the wealthy at the expense of school children.
“The people are going to have to overpower the lobbyists,” Cuomo said. “The peoples’ voice wins in a democracy. But the peoples’ voice must be heard ... tell your elected representatives in Albany that enough is enough. Pass the tax cap now or don’t come home.”
Back in Albany, a broad coalition including teachers and other public workers’ unions, the League of Women Voters and other good-government groups urged the Legislature to alter Cuomo’s proposal. The Omnibus Consortium said a “hard” property tax cap of 2 percent growth a year will hurt schools and local social services while not providing tax relief to those who need it most. The group wants a “circuit breaker” that would factor in taxpayers’ incomes to drive more tax relief to middle and lower income New Yorkers, and less to wealthier property owners to continue what the group considers adequate funding for schools and local government services and their workers.
“The simplest solution to a problem is not always the most effective,” said Bill Samuels, founder of the government reform group called the New Roosevelt Initiative. “Overburdened taxpayers with limited incomes need personal property tax relief now. And woe to the politician who supports this rhetorically popular, but ill-conceived, tax cap when their constituents open their next tax bill and find no relief.”
Gioia Shebar of the group Tax Nightmare says Cuomo’s cap is a gift to corporate taxpayers.
“The discredited cap doesn’t meet any need but for politicians to look busy,” Shebar said. “Our inequitable, chaotic tax system — which cries out for reform — has resulted in that classic moment when panicked leaders say, ‘Shut up and drink the Kool-Aid,’” Shebar said Tuesday.
Cuomo stopped at Syracuse’s Onondaga Community College Tuesday to kick off the tour scheduled to continue through the final weeks of the legislative session, which ends in late June. Cuomo is expected to focus on the property tax in upstate stops and on Long Island, where the issue has long been a priority of residents. The gay marriage bill he favors is expected to continue to be an issue in New York City, where support has been strongest in polls.
He will walk a fine line by going into local markets to pressure lawmakers without antagonizing the Legislature. Former Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s similar effort in 2007 resulted in gridlock.
Cuomo is also expected to push for his ethics reform measure, which is being negotiated with legislative leaders in closed-door sessions. No bill or draft has yet been released for the measure, which would be aimed at forcing greater disclosure of income and higher standards for lawmakers.
The popular Democrat’s cap proposal would limit the growth in local property taxes, already among the highest in the nation, to 2 percent annually or the rate of inflation, whichever is less. Local voters could override the cap with a 60-percent vote. A few exemptions of unforeseeable expenses could also suspend the cap.
“The cap will put the odds in favor of the taxpayer, because the deck has been stacked against the taxpayers for too long,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo said local government and school property taxes rose 73 percent over the last decade, more than double the inflation rate. That forces people from their homes and stymies job growth, he said.
The Republican-led Senate has already passed Cuomo’s proposal, but is refusing to negotiate what its members would consider a weakening of the measure. Cuomo’s bill is sponsored in the Democrat-led Assembly by Speaker Sheldon Silver, but it hasn’t moved any closer to a floor vote and the Democrats from New York City who lead the chamber are being pressured by teacher unions that oppose the cap.
Cuomo sends message to Legislature: Pass the property tax cap
• Written by Jon Campbell
jcampbell1@gannett.com
ALBANY -- When it comes to his property tax cap proposal, Gov. Andrew Cuomo delivered his harshest message yet to the Legislature: pass it, or don't come home.
In a video message released Tuesday morning, Cuomo challenged New Yorkers to push legislators to pass his bill, which would establish a hard, 2 percent annual cap on property tax levies by local governments and schools.
Cuomo's message coincided with the launch of a statewide tour promoting his legislative agenda, which kicked off Tuesday in Syracuse.
"Remember, the people's voice wins in a democracy, but the people's voice must be heard," Cuomo said in the video. "Tell your representatives in Albany that enough is enough; pass the tax cap now or don't come home."
The governor's push came the same day advocates both for and against the tax cap gathered in Albany. A pro-cap rally quickly devolved into a back-and-forth shouting match Tuesday morning, with opponents chanting "tax the rich" while lawmakers tried to voice their support for the bill.
Soon after things wrapped up, the two sides argued their case on the floor of the Legislative Office Building -- at times loudly and inches apart -- as reporters snapped photos and television cameras rolled.
Opponents of a cap have pushed for a "circuit breaker" approach, which would limit property-tax rates for low- and middle-income taxpayers.
Ron Deutsch, executive director of New Yorkers for Fiscal Fairness, said the circuit breaker is the choice of the people, and the only way to provide meaningful relief.
"The reality is what the governor is talking about is increasing taxes for people on an annual basis," Deutsch said. "So if I can't afford my property taxes now, what good is a tax cap going to do me? Only a circuit breaker would help me in that situation."
Assemblywoman Ellen Jaffee, D-Suffern, Rockland County, was critical of a tax cap, calling it a "sound bite, not sound policy" at an anti-cap press conference. Her concerns echo those of many county, municipal and education leaders, who have said a cap without relief from mandate costs would spell trouble for local governments' finances.
"It is a policy that is a recipe for disaster in our education system, and in our municipalities in New York state," Jaffee said. "It does not provide tax relief, and while we all recognized the need for property-tax relief, we need to moveforward with the appropriate legislation that will actually offer that."
But Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan, told reporters Tuesday he has no plans to take up circuit-breaker legislation. Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos said he supports a hard cap, with no exemptions for pensions, health care or other expenses.
The Senate passed Cuomo's tax-cap proposal in January, but the Democrat-led Assembly has been reluctant to take it up. Assembly Democrats plan to reveal a compromise bill in the coming days that will cap taxes at 2 percent, but will include some exemptions, Silver told reporters Tuesday.
"We are finalizing the bill," Silver said. "We've briefed the governor on it. He's aware of it, and we will introduce it one of these days."
Silver declined to discuss the specifics of his conference's proposal, but some Assembly Democrats said last week that talks had centered around allowing the bill to expire in three to five years and exempting pension costs from the cap.
Skelos said Tuesday his conference will "look at it" if Cuomo decides to "weaken" his proposal, but reiterated Senate Republicans¹ support a hard cap.
"The governor has been very clear, and we stand with the governor, that he wants a hard property-tax cap," Skelos said.
But speaking with reporters after presenting his agenda in Syracuse, Cuomo said the bill must pass both houses for the Senate to claim success.
"If the tax cap passes and people have tax relief, then government will have done its job," Cuomo said. "If a tax cap doesn't pass, government will have failed. It's that simple. To me, it's binary."
###
Tax cap a moving target
Officials say Gov. Cuomo's proposal is on right track but changes threaten deal
By JIMMY VIELKIND Capitol bureau
Published 12:01 a.m., Wednesday, May 11, 2011
ALBANY -- During a media blitz to build support for a 2 percent cap on property tax increases, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the Republican-led Senate shouldn't get "an A for effort" for passing in January ... a tax cap bill drafted by Cuomo's office.
"That's Albany-speak," said Cuomo, a Democrat, after a rally in a Syracuse suburb. "That's 'I passed a bill, the other person didn't pass a bill.' ... When the people of the state of New York have a property tax cap, then they will have done their job."
In an earlier videotaped message, Cuomo said lawmakers must enact a cap "or don't come home" to their districts.
It's a rare acknowledgment of the back-and-forth legislative process that results in most laws in the state. Politically, the governor's singling out the Senate Republicans on this issue moves him into closer alignment with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan.
A Cuomo aide said the governor's comment applied to both legislative leaders, but it illustrates a shift: For the past several months of his term, Cuomo was allied with Skelos to enact a budget that did not renew an income tax surcharge on New Yorkers earning over $200,000. The governor has preached fiscal conservatism, and the enacted budget largely mirrored Cuomo's proposals. (As a result, Cuomo now enjoys a higher job approval rating among Republicans than among Democrats in a Marist College poll released Tuesday.)
Skelos has even touted passage of the property tax cap, in the form of a "program bill" submitted by Cuomo, as a symbol of his proximity to the governor. But he was left slightly on the defensive Tuesday as news of Cuomo's comments reached Albany.
"If the governor feels (the cap) should be weakened, then he should say it should be weakened," said Skelos, R-Long Island. "That's up to the Assembly. They could pass the bill or not pass the bill."
Silver said Tuesday he has briefed Cuomo on his house's proposal, which his aides are "finalizing" and which will be introduced "one of these days." He declined to offer details, but said it would contain "not too many exemptions" for perennial cost drivers such as pension costs and health care.
Local government leaders from both parties as well as school board officials have said a tax cap without relief of some mandates would be ruinous for their finances.
Last week, Assemblyman Joe Morelle, D-Rochester, told Gannett News Service he would like to see a temporary three-year cap that excluded pension costs. Most lawmakers read this as a floated point for negotiation.
"Certainly we're looking at doing a meaningful, real property tax cap, but from my position there's got to be some assistance for the locals, including pension costs and possibly health care costs, so we don't tie their hands in a very rigid manner," said Assembly Majority Leader Ron Canestrari, D-Cohoes.
It's a tough line to walk. Two competing rallies -- one in favor of a straight cap, the other calling for a "circuit breaker" which would offer property tax relief by increasing income taxes (and which Silver, who has passed a similar measure in the past, said was off the table this year) -- converged Tuesday at the Capitol, and devolved into a screaming match.
So -- to negotiate or not to negotiate? And how similar is that question to asking whether legislators' true goal is the enactment of a law or a political sound bite?
"The people doing the screaming is a small group of people," said Assembly Minority Leader Brian Kolb, R-Canandaigua, as he watched the shouting. He wants the Assembly to vote on Cuomo's bill. While his Republicans don't have a majority of votes, he was confident it would pass.
"It's always about the moving target," he added. "If we keep introducing new ideas, new measures, new approaches, you never get a vote on the main issue, and the main issue is Gov. Cuomo is the governor of the state. It's his program bill."
Reach Vielkind at 454-5081 or jvielkind@timesunion.com.
###
